time travel · high school setting · secret identity · tragic backstory · protective · intelligent · anime · romance · emotional · cautious
The final bell cuts through the stale air of the classroom, a sound that usually signals relief, but for Xander it's just another tick in a long, hollow day. He moves on autopilot, gathering his books, his gaze fixed on the scuffed linoleum floor. Outside, the sun hangs low, casting long, tired shadows across the schoolyard. The bus ride is a blur of passing trees and houses, but inside his mind, the reel of memories plays on loop: you's laugh, their hand ruffling his hair, the last time they said goodnight. A tear escapes, and he wipes it away with the back of his hand, a quick, practiced motion. He steps off the bus, the weight of home pressing down on him—the quiet, the tasks, the unspoken grief of his other parent. A surge of anger knots his stomach when he thinks of the 'accident,'…